Sakura
DEApparently, they hire unprofessional reviewers I'm a professional freelance translator, and taken their test just to see. They rejected my translation, and they just said that "I made too many errors" citing just one example. This example was not exactly an error, which just showed how illiterate and ignorant the "native" reviewer is about his (my) language. If they think they are hiring qualified translators this way, you can just guess the level of translation you will get. Don't waste money on them. If you think I'm just taking out on them for rejecting me, fine, please go on and waste your money and time.
Annett Roessner
AUThis is what you need to do to get a high quality translation I have been translating for Gengo for a couple of months now and have had a read through the reviews with many clients complaining about issues with their translation. I basically only ever work on jobs at the Pro level rate of $0.09 because only this rate allows for enough time to produce a quality translation. In regards to the bad reviews: I believe this is a matter of you get what you paid for. If you submit your translation as a standard translation the translator gets paid a measly $0.03 to $0.035 per word which is way below industry standards (at least a third lower than what a professional translator usually charges). Generally speaking, a translator translates around 300 words per hour. This means a translator makes around $9.00 per hour at these rates. In most countries this would be below minimum wage and without any of the perks that come with being employed (annual leave, sick leave, paid public holidays. So, in order to make some money a translator will need to churn out at least 600 words per hour if not more. Hence, the quality of this translation will never be as good as a translation done for the Pro rate of $0.09. Put simply if you want a high quality translation please submit your job as a Pro job and a professional translator will work on your translation. You simply cannot expect a high quality translation at the standard rate. For even higher quality translations, provide as much context as possible and a glossary if needed. Also, if you submit your translation through their system it gets split across different translators. This means that your final translation will be inconsistent in style and terminology. In order to avoid this simply submit your translation in a word document or excel spreadsheet. A professional translator will then ensure style and terminology are consistent across your whole document. I hope this is helpful. Thanks, Your Master educated Professional Gengo Translator
Davichi
GBWish I had read the reviews before… Wish I had read the reviews before wasting time and money on Gengo. Save yourself some hassle and just use google translate because that is what they will do. Although I paid for a pricier bespoke service, I was given a translation that was a word for word Google translation. It lacked nuance and was riddled with 'Google translate' mistakes that a native speaker would never make. Even though I repeatedly pointed out the errors to the supposedly 'native speaking' translator, the issue was never resolved. The customer service team was equally unhelpful and they seem to operate a "no refunds no matter what" policy. An altogether unpleasant and highly tedious experience, I will not use this company again.
Alex
BYwaste of time There are very few jobs available. After a month of constant monitoring I didn't manage to get any job. Besides they don't allow you to move to the ProLevel. They reject your translations giving absolutely stupid explanations so that it becomes obvious that they just want you to remain at the lowest paid level.
Jon
GBMachine translations at human prices This company is selling machine translation at human translation prices. If you actually speak the language natively you'll understand this when you see translations for words like "Sign up" directly converted into phonetic foreign borrow words like サインアップする instead of the natural and correct translation of 登録する. I rejected the translations stating this, but Gengo staff said my rejection wasn't valid and that these were "quality translations." AVOID THIS COMPANY AT ALL COSTS.